The present invention relates to a method and apparatus of exercising the eyes. More particularly, this invention relates to a progressive and interactive method and apparatus of exercising the eyes and relieving eye stress and strain resulting from extended viewing video display terminals (VDT).
The United States economy, as well as that of many other foreign countries, has moved from an industrial era to a service era and has now entered the information age. The computer has become the common denominator for providing services and information in today's workforce. Based on data from the American Optometric Association, 44 million workers in the United States interact with a computer in the course of their daily work activities. It is estimated that 15 million workers in the United States work with a computer extensively each day and would be classified as VDT operators. It is predicted that this number will rise to 28 million by 1993. These statistics are even more overwhelming when coupled with the dramatic rise in the number of people who continue to use personal computers at home, after work hours.
This explosive growth in the use of computers, and the resultant benefits they bring in all segments of the economy, has not been without problems. The eyes are the gateway to the mind and body, which makes VDT work possible. However, demands on the visual system, in the form of use of VDTs has placed VDT users in a very precarious position. Increased usage of the VDTs means greater demands on the visual system.
A large proportion of people who work with a computer on a regular basis experience some form of stress and/or physical discomfort of the eyes, as a result of that use. Some of these problems are not caused by the eye itself, but stress and fatigue of the muscles that control the eye. These problems are further magnified by the fact that difficulties in seeing and focusing generally increase with the age of the user. Although stress and fatigue of the eye muscles is common among regular VDT users, similar eye problems can be seen in many other occupations or activities that largely depend upon the eyes. Eye muscle problems can affect the users in many ways, some of which include deterioration of visual abilities, decreased productivity, increased employee turnover, and health insurance claims.
To prevent a deterioration in visual capabilities, the ocular muscles must be able to adapt to do the increased demands posed by long-term use of VDT. This requires a physiological improvement to provide the necessary level of adaptation to the muscular task. Vision is a neuro-muscular action that responds to the stimulus of light. Vision is a learned skill that can be trained to improve control. Three visual skills have been identified as being important to VDT usage. These three skills are: fusion (ability of the eyes to work together as a unit; accommodation (ability of the eyes to focus near, then far, without experiencing blurred vision); and saccadic movement (ability of the eyes to move accurately and rapidly). Eye movement is controlled by six muscles in each eye, and like all trainable muscles, when properly trained, produce efficient results. Likewise, when trainable eye muscles are "out of shape or overworked", the same effect results as with any other muscle in the body: fatigue, strain, movement error and pain.
It is known that physical training imposes stress on the body tissues, in particular, the muscles. Regular muscular activity, which occurs during training, can be considered a positive form of stress because it stimulates growth and improves muscular performance. Most of the changes that occur in a muscle, as a result of training, are gradual and occur over several weeks or months. The magnitude of these muscular adaptations is somewhat proportional to the amount of exercise performed during training. Muscles will adapt optimally, however, to exercise that moderately exceeds its capacity, necessitating a gradual progression in training load in order to maximize muscle performance.
Attempts to address the problems of eye stress and fatigue, to this date, have involved devices to reduce glare of VDT screens, rest breaks for VDT users and prescription glasses. These solutions have only provided for after the fact symptomatic relief and have not attacked and attempted to lessen or eliminate the root causes of the problem muscle strain and fatigue. Known eye exercises to this date have been used primarily for diagnosing or testing for eye problems. Even relatively simple exercises have not been developed for many eye problems. Those that have been developed strictly as exercises to strengthen the eye muscles, have not offered a full range of necessary exercise, have been rather crude, have not offered progressive training, or have not offered quantitative measures of progress or ability related to the exercises. Furthermore, these exercises have not been capable of easily and inexpensively being integrated into a computer user's environment or providing immediate feedback to the individual user.